St. Dunstan's Episcopal Church, Atlanta, Georgia

 

March 2008
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Contents

Journeying With Jesus

This month we celebrate the highlight of the Christian year, the victory of life over death with the resurrection of Jesus on Easter morning. I am sure the church will be full, as it should be, for this grand and glorious celebration.

The finding of that empty tomb on that first Easter morning so many hundreds of years ago was a dramatic moment. But to fully appreciate the power and meaning of the resurrection, one has to understand what happened in the days before – the betrayal and abandonment of Jesus by his friends, his arrest, torture and murder.

Every year, the church reenacts those events from the final week of Jesus’ life during Holy Week, the week before Easter. The church is not so full for those services, but those who come to them inevitably comment on how moving these liturgies are, and how their journey through Holy Week deepens their appreciation of the miracle of Easter morning.

That first Holy Week, Jesus’ disciples abandoned him, leaving him to face arrest, torture and death alone. Will we abandon him again this year, or will we journey with him to the cross?

Palm Sunday (March 16, 8: 30 and 10:45 a.m.) We begin the service in the beech grove, weather permitting, and process into church waving palm fronds and shouting “Hosanna,” as we remember Jesus’ triumphant entry into Jerusalem. At the gospel reading, the mood of the service changes dramatically as we read the story of Jesus’ arrest, trial, and crucifixion. Also this day, the choir will sing a special anthem commissioned in memory of our former parishioner Charlie Yates (see Steve’s article for more information). Note: No Sunday school this day.

Wednesday in Holy Week (March 19) Join us at noon for the Eucharist, followed by a simple lunch in the parish hall. Note: No Village Supper this evening.

Maundy Thursday (March 20) Maundy is from the Greek word meaning commandment. On this day we remember Jesus’ command to his followers on the light night of his life–to love one another as he has loved them. We will begin at 6 p.m. with a simple supper ($10 person, sign up in the narthex). The liturgy begins at 7 p.m. In this moving service, we are all invited to participate in washing one another’s feet, as Jesus did for his disciples the last night of his life. The service continues with the Eucharist, and ends in silence as the altar is stripped bare for Good Friday. Note: Childcare is available.

Good Friday (March 21) The service for this most somber day of the Christian year begins at noon with the Good Friday liturgy and continues until 3 p.m. with meditations on the Stations of the Cross, prayers, and music. Please feel free to come to any or all of the service, as you are able.

Easter Vigil (March 22, 7 p.m.) This dramatic service begins in the beech grove with the lighting of the new fire, from which the Paschal, or Easter, candle is lit. We process by candlelight into a darkened church to hear scripture stories of God’s acts of salvation. Midway through the service we turn on the lights, and ring bells as we joyously proclaim that Lent is over and Christ has risen. Note: Childcare is provided. The celebration continues after the service with a champagne and cake reception.

Easter Sunday (March 23, 8:30 and 10:45 a.m.) Come celebrate Jesus’ resurrection on this most festive day of the Christian year. An Easter egg hunt will be held for the children after the late service. Note: No Sunday School this day.

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Announcements

 

Don't forget to
move your clocks ahead one hour
on Saturday, March 8
before going to bed!

 

St. Dunstan's in the news!

Watch the Atlanta Journal-Constitution this month for two stories about St. Dunstan’s. As the Bellows went to press, AJC reporters were working on stories about our Stations of the Cross (to run in the North Fulton section) and the choral anthem commissioned for St. Dunstan’s by the Yates Family Fund in memory of Charlie Yates. Show these articles to your friends and invite them to join us at St. Dunstan’s.

 

 

Join us for Vacation Bible School
June 9-13

Go Green with God!

 

 

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Were You There?

Were you there when they crucified my Lord?
Were you there when they crucified my Lord?
Oh! Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.
Were you there when they crucified my Lord?

Were you there when they nailed him to the tree?
Were you there when they nailed him to the tree?
Oh! Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.
Were you there when they nailed him to the tree?

Were you there when they pierced him in the side?
Were you there when they pierced him in the side?
Oh! Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.
Were you there when they pierced him in the side?

Were you there when they laid him in the tomb?
Were you there when they laid him in the tomb?
Oh! Sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble.
Were you then when they laid him in the tomb?

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Many Thanks

 

Thank you to all who helped make the Walter Brueggemann lecture and dinner such a success. Thanks to the men who set up tables; to Joseph Henry Monti, who set the tables; and to Jane Lamkin, who provided lovely flowers. And a special thanks to those who cooked and cleaned up -- Pat Berman, Beth Clinton, Priscilla Davis, Nancy Dillon, Nancy Knight Latimore, Elise MacIntyre, Elizabeth Wong Mark, Jeanne Taylor, Betty Whittier, Nancy Young, and Natalie Komlos-Zeiler.

Thank you to Geoff Walker for fixing a leaking pipe in the sacristy.

Thank you to our Shrove Tuesday pancake cookers – Bill Hancock and Paul Ruhmkorff, to Mary Summerville and Ruth Roser for providing fruit, and to Gilda Morris for providing decorations for the celebration.

Thank you to Lynn Hood for producing a postcard about our Holy Week and Easter services to be mailed to homes in Smyrna and Vinings.

Thanks to all who contributed to the outdoor Stations of the Cross – to Tim Black for coordinating the project, to Bruce Lafitte and Wayne Lord for helping to put up the posts, to Colin Black for making the metal numbers for each station, and to those who made or provided crosses: Helen Branch, the Ledet-Withers family, Margaret Michaelides, Tim Black, Claudia Gimson, the children of St. Dunstan’s, Peachy Horne, Reuben Black, Colin Brown, Bruce Lafitte, and the Hancock family.

 

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Easter Flowers and Music

 

The St. Dunstan's Flower Guild Ministry

The congregation is invited to donate to the Flower Guild, join the Flower Guild or to do both.

Remember someone special with a gift for Easter flowers and/or music. Please use the envelopes found in the pews. All remembrances will be printed in the Easter day bulletins.

For Easter, we decorate not only the altar, but also the paschal candle and have lilies in front of the altar. We want Easter to be glorious!!!! Please give generously.

All of Easter is available; anyone interested in donating flowers can do so in honor or in memory of someone or just to the glory of God. Palm Sunday, Easter Sunday, Pentecost Sunday and Trinity Sunday will be designed by the Flower Guild.

There is no requirement to join the Flower Guild other than a desire to design flower arrangements, or to learn how to design arrangements. We do encourage folks to work together: “For when two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them.” Matthew 18:20

To donate: just list yourself under Flower Donors on the sign-up sheet in the Narthex; to arrange: list yourself under Flower Designers All are welcome. You can donate and have one of us design and arrange, or you can buy, design and arrange yourself.

Flower Guild: Gilda Morris and Ginny Ruhmkorff co-chairs), Christine Beard, Nancy Dillon, and Tonia Hopkins.

 

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Christian Formation

Dear Friends,

I am really fired up about our Vacation Bible School this year! Our theme is Go Green with God. Recently, at the Diocesan Ministry Fair, I attended a workshop led by Woody Bartlett. Woody is a priest in this diocese who has been the rector of St. Bart’s, worked on developing housing for folks with disabilities, and, most recently, founded Georgia Interfaith Power and Light, an organization dedicated to helping congregations lead the way in energy conservation. Some of you may know Woody as he was here last summer filling in for Tricia. In the workshop Woody took us from the time of the Hebrews to the present day examining how western civilization has viewed and treated the environment. Admittedly, there was no way to do justice to this topic in one short presentation, still the main point that I took away from the workshop is that we tend to view ourselves as separate from the rest of Creation instead of part of it. This is a distorted view of reality which leads to all sorts of problems, especially environmental ones! Woody feels that the main contribution that the church can make today is to challenge this culturally-prevalent mind set. Woody urges us to think of the Kingdom of God in terms of all of Creation, not just God’s people. This goal – realizing that we are part of the Creation and that our relationship to the rest of Creation is one of interdependence – will form the foundation for our Vacation Bible School this year. We will get to know our environment at St. Dunstan’s –the woods and the pond – and understand how we are part of these ecosystems. We will hear about St. Francis and his gentle way with animals. We will learn a bit about Native American spirituality. We will do art, music, drama, and cooking that enhance our understanding of and connection to our environment. Vacation Bible School, at its best, is always an experience of Community, but this year we will consciously extend our sense of community to include animals, nature, indeed, all of Creation! I hope your children will join us, and please invite your friends and neighbors too. I hope that you will join us as a volunteer for whatever time you are able. More information and the opportunity to register are on our website.

Faithfully,
Ellen

 

Jesus’s Last Supper with his disciples, which we remember on Maundy Thursday, was a Passover seder. On Sunday, March 9th, Kerren Berz will be our guest during the Sunday school hour to lead the children who are in the elementary and middle school classes in a seder and teach them about this Jewish tradition. This is a great opportunity for our kids…I hope yours will be able to attend.

The Godly Play class needs long-sleeved, button down children-sized shirts that can be used as smocks. Please let Ellen know if you have these to donate.

Godspell on April 27th: Some of the middle school students and their parents will be attending the Theatrical Outfit’s production of Godspell on April 27 th at 2:30 p.m. (after St. Dunstan’s Annual Meeting). Godspell is a hip, musical re-telling of the Gospel according to Matthew. The music and lyrics are by Stephen Schwartz who also wrote the music for Wicked. If you would like to join us, please talk with Ellen about the availability of discounted tickets.(404-266-1018)

 

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From the Organist and Choirmaster

 

Music for Holy Week, Ancient and Modern

The great liturgical cycle of Holy Week, beginning with Palm Sunday and continuing through the events of the Crucifixion and Resurrection, is once again upon us. The overwhelming events of these eight days, with all of their inherent drama and profound implications, have provided composers for centuries with sources of inspiration. This year, the congregation of St. Dunstan’s will have the opportunity to experience, through your own musical offerings and those of your musicians, a wide variety of music composed expressly for this glorious time. Many of the texts and melodies heard during this week are many centuries old, drawn from the very foundations of our Christian musical heritage. In addition to various seasonal hymns and anthems, the music of Holy Week will include:

Palm Sunday : The St. Dunstan Choir will premiere a new, large-scale anthem for chorus and organ based on the old familiar hymn, “In the Garden,” a favorite of parishioner Charlie Yates, in whose memory the piece has been commissioned. The composer is the young, energetic, and award-winning James Stephenson of Naples, Florida. Jim is no stranger to St. Dunstan’s: Two years ago, the Choir premiered another of his choral works, the gentle motet, “Blessed Savior.” (For more information on the composer, please visit his website at http://www.stephensonmusic.com.)

Maundy Thursday : A choral setting by French composer Maurice Duruflé of the Gregorian chant Ubi caritas, the text and melody of which have for centuries been associated with the Washing of Feet and the institution of the Holy Eucharist, events which we celebrate on this Holy Day. Although the Choir will sing the text in the original Latin, The Hymnal 1982 provides three translations:

576, 577:

God is love, and where true love is

581:
 Where charity and love prevail
606:

Where true charity and love dwell

Good Friday : One of the most beautiful ways to follow the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ is to meditate during the Three Hours Devotion, beginning at Noon. Among the many musical elements of this solemn observance are the Reproaches (assembled from various biblical and liturgical sources, including the prophets) which are chanted before the Cross following the Passion Gospel—a custom dating back to ca. 1200, but believed to be a vestige of an earlier, suppressed Gallican rite. The setting for double choir by G. P. da Palestrina dates from 1573, the year of the death of his son. The manuscript is from the archives of the church of St. John Lateran in Rome.

Additionally, the Good Friday Liturgy will include a selection from the ancient text Stabat Mater dolorosa, chronicling the sorrow of the Virgin Mary while witnessing the Crucifixion, in a setting by the 18 th-century Italian composer, Giovanni Pergolesi. In sharp contrast to this Baroque work is the beautiful spiritual, “Were You There When they Crucified My Lord”—especially appropriate for this day—and the motet “Blessed Savior,” commissioned by the St. Dunstan Choir especially for this service and premiered in 2006. The striking and evocative text is taken from the rarely-heard “Daily Devotions” section of The Book of Common Prayer (page 138) and has been set with wonderful sensitivity by composer James Stephenson.

The Great Vigil of Easter: In the darkness, the New Fire is lit, and we hear the first music of Easter: The great paschal hymn Exsultet (“Rejoice now, heavenly hosts and choirs of angels”), one of the oldest and most important hymns of the Church, which “sets the stage” for the Resurrection.

Easter Sunday: Christ’s Resurrection will be celebrated with a variety of thrilling hymns, organ music, and choral works, including the “Antiphon of Spring,” a lovely and unusual motet by Boston composer Everett Titcomb (1885-1968) on texts from the Song of Solomon. This beautiful allegory parallels the Resurrection of Christ with the arrival of Spring and the return of life to the earth.

May all the music of Holy Week guide and inspire you in your worship as together we celebrate these sacred mysteries and glorious events.

Faithfully,
Steve

 

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A Lenten Reflection

Death is Something We Live With

I used to avoid Holy Week. No way was I getting into death; I was waiting on resurrection. However, death is something we live with – death of people we love, death of relationships, as well as death of addictions. Resurrection cannot happen without death first. Resurrection is worth going through the darkness and death of Holy Week.

As many of you know, Lee and I spent from mid-September until mid-January traveling to Alabama at least once a week while his brother, Riley, was in the hospital. Riley died on January 16 at the age of 52. How do we deal with that?

Lent gives us an opportunity to mourn those whose death has saddened us deeply, as well as to die unto ourselves those things which we need to let die. We have an opportunity to go as deep into our faith as we possibly can. The experience of all that Holy Week offers sustains me as I mourn.

Holy Week is the deepest part of my Lenten journey. I begin this journey on Palm Sunday as we process and sing and make crosses out of our palm leaves.

At the Maundy Thursday Agape meal and foot washing, my feelings intensify as first I allow my feet to be washed, and then as I wash another’s. There is a deep stirring in my soul as the altar is stripped. It is holy.

On Good Friday, I sit in awe as we listen to the music and the readings of the Stations of the Cross. I know I can leave at anytime, but I find it over before I even get restless. It is holy.

The Saturday Vigil is breathtaking as we begin with a bonfire in the beech grove and then we witness together the glory of Easter being unveiled before our eyes! It is holy.

Easter morning I come to rejoice. I love the services and I love being with others during this holy time. I need God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit in my heart; I need the people of St. Dunstan’s as I walk through the valley of death. ~Gilda Morris

 

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Passages

Our Sympathy to Priscilla Davis on the death of her sister, JoAnn Bradley.

Our Sympathy to Ruth Askew on the death of her mother, Jane Heard Askew.

Welcome to new member Tony Powers, from St. Martin in the Fields.

Transfering out areTom and Bettye Schneider, to St. Benedict’s.

 

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From the Treasurer's Office

Treasurer's Update

Operating expenses exceeded income during the first month of this year. This illustrates the importance of maintaining a cash reserve. It is helpful to the financial process if pledge gifts can be made on aregular schedule, i.e. weekly, monthly, or quarterly.

January operating income
$22,380.41
January operating expenses
$25,720.84
Difference
($3,340.43)

We will be keeping the congregation apprised of our financial situation every month in this space. The monthly Treasurer’s report will also be placed on the bulletin board in the coffee area and the office meeting area every month. Don’t hesitate to contact Nancy Elliott if you have any questions.

 

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Also This Month!

St. Dunstan’s Fourth Annual Lenten Film Series will be held this year on the first three Sundays this month. All movies will begin at 2 p.m. at the home of Eleanor Ringel Gillespie. The films will be followed by discussions led by AJC movie writer and St. Dunstan’s junior warden Bob Longino. Look for sign up sheets in the Narthex. Here’s the lineup:

  • March 2 – “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.” Local moviegoers had little chance to see this beautifully filmed Western which features a strong performance by Brad Pitt as Jesse James and an astonishing one by Oscar-nominated rising star Casey Affleck as Robert Ford.
  • March 9 – “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” - This film tells the remarkable tale of Jean-Dominique Bauby, the world-renowned editor of Elle magazine, who was paralyzed by a stroke at age 43. Bauby's only way of communicating was by blinking with one eye. And yet he managed to write his memoir.
  • March 16 – Family double feature of film shorts – the Oscar-winning short “The Red Balloon,” and the Oscar-nominated animated short “Peter & the Wolf.” “Balloon” is a monumental, near silent, French film from post-WWII Paris about a small boy and the magical balloon that begins to follow him everywhere. “Peter” is a new version of the classic Prokofiev composition.

 

Wondrous Love: Southern Folk Passion Service

March 16, 4:30 p.m. at Druid Hills Baptist Church· 1085 Ponce de Leon Avenue – The agony and splendor of the last days of Christ are brought back to life by Brenda Bynum's haunting retelling of the gospel. Plaintive traditional music recalls the emotional intensity of the Passion of Christ. Harmonies almost too close to hear bring heaven and earth together. The Meridian Chorale will perform, which includes our own Laura Withers. www.meridianherald.org .

 

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Deadline for articles for the April Bellows is March 15.
Please email your articles or leave them in Kim Branch’s
mailbox in the church office.

 

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Our Schedule, Most Always


Sundays

Holy Eucharist at 8:30 a.m. and 10:30 a.m.
Christian Education for all ages at 9:30 a.m.

Wednesdays

4:30 - 5:15 p.m.
St. Cecilia Choir (ages 8 and up)
5:30 - 5:55 p.m.

St. Julian Choir (ages 4-7)
6:00 p.m. Holy Eucharist and Village Supper *
7:00 - 9:15 p.m.
St. Dunstan's Adult Choir

* Bring a dish to share, bought or homemade, to the Parish Hall at 6 p.m.

 

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2006-2007 Vestry

Wayne Lord—Senior Warden
Richard Stansbury—Junior Warden
Nancy Dillon
 
Susan Elliott
Tonia Hopkins
 
Nancy Knight Latimore
Bob Longino
 
Jeanne Taylor
Danny Woodard

Our Staff

The Rev. Patricia Templeton, Rector
The Rev. Maggie Harney, Priest Associate
Ellen Gallow, Director of Christian Education
Stephen L. Furches, Organist-Choirmaster
Kim Branch, Parish Administrator
Paul Ruhmkorff , Treasurer
Bruce Lafitte, Vestry Clerk

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Contact Us | ©2007 St. Dunstan's Episcopal Church, Atlanta, GA